Article about: Hello! I guess that all of these skulls are fakes but I have to ask anyway. I can´s see any markings on the photo. Does they always have Rzm and "m+number" markings? /Mike
These volumes are the ones I refer to above. They are among the very best works extant, and set the highest standard of historical research. The Schiffer books are pretty lame in comparison, since the latter has no editorial process. The Bender books are obsolete in terms of graphic presentation and lay out. The works from French and Spanish authors published in Europe are also of high quality, but these books of Verlag Militaria in Wien are really outstanding.
But, because I am a man of the mid 20th century, I note that what I attach are costly books, an elitist object.
I am also obsolete with my fixation on the outdated artifact of former centuries, as well as too enamored of what I learned in a twenty year apprenticeship as "scholarship," and that, today, seekers here expect to understand the complexities of central Europe in a few minutes of Wikipedia mouse clicking as well as service by dumb sh!ts like me to their breezy questions.
On the other forum was a staggering question to unravel the complexities of SS organization in one web posting (i.e. organization evolution of same from say 1925 until 1944....!?), an issue about which a nice, heavy shelf of books exists. The reach of people here exceeds their grasp.
Happy Deschler, Overhoff, and Assmann to all who might read these lines, and may your Neusilber, cupal and Feinzink be merry in the season to come.
Here are some primary sources for orders and decorations of the era, but these men here knew the answers to our struggle, or knew someone who knew someone..... For those not in the know: Uniformenmarkt and Schwert und Spaten were specialized industry and trade journals. They are also apparently reprinted, so might someone kindly tell me how to find them?
Or these apprentices knew, too, and granted their age, maybe one of them is still alive...? This image is ca. 1935-38 of some small tailoring outfit in Oberbayern. The archives of a Munich sewing machine firm are for sale in ZVAB, and I am sure there is something of merit in said material, but it ain't cheap.
The Totenschaedel badge had a human face you see in all these posts, that is, they were made by a few scores of people, or maybe by hundreds. We deserve to give these people their due, and in so doing, we get closer to some truth than arguing over "prongs" and generalizing from the few dozen or maybe couple of hundred surviving examples of what were mass produced items in the mid 20th century and which by accident are now in the hands of less than a hundred people or maybe more. That is, those collectors with a few or more of these badges who in turn post on sites and debate their merits and whatnot.
Perhaps far less than a hundred people, in fact, when I generalize from the posts on these sites over the course of this odd and conflicted decade.
I make this generalization via a back of the envelope analysis of the members' statistics of these sites, and the frequency of posts of authentic regalia.
One is not talking about a large sample of the whole, but I am not a trained statistician, but a professional historian. I am sure someone at home in said statistical analysis could somehow assign numbers to this, and also someone could estimate the total number of these badges made in the years 1933-1945, i.e. an SS man may or may not have had two caps, and these were worn for said period, and what not. This hypothetical total number could be levied against the extant examples present in websites that are more or less agreed as real. I am sure the difference between the total number and the remnants would be sobering. That is, do the surviving examples allow generalizations about the whole? We make the assumption that the remaining sample does allow such generalization, but I am skeptical, because of the array of unknown unknowns to quote Herman Kahn.
But this is not my task, and I still have jet lag.
Dear F-B, thank you for all kind words, jet lag or not, it's a pleasure to read what you have to say.
What do you think of this eagle, posted on the other forum?
(All credit goes to "miken")
Also credit to Robert H who posted, "803 Hoheitsabzeichen für erdgraue Dienstmütze in Aluminium -.22"
The others have voiced some doubts about this piece on the nasty web site, which I frankly share. The Sutterlin writing looks off, and, the other examples of Proben from the military, the NSDAP and SS are different in certain, subtle ways.
But I could quite wrong. This insignia was introduced in the fall of 1935, actually, or that is, it first appeared at said date.
These electronic images are all misleading, and, moreover, all the data necessary for this kind of thing are in the internet for the skilled faker.
Re: A couple of totenkopfs probably fakes or?
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by Anders S
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